• jeffw@lemmy.worldOP
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    6 months ago

    Anyone else remember when the Libertarian party was actually libertarian? Now they’re pathetic enough to be torn between Trump and RFK

    • xmunk
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      6 months ago

      I don’t. I know there used to be semi-legitimate public Libertarians like Penn Jillette but even his brand of Libertarianism was just bullshit and those folks got right aboard the antivax train. American Libretarianism has always been quintessentially “Rules for thee not me.”

      • Queue@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        6 months ago

        At least Penn admitted he was wrong and that Libertarian thinking is what caused anti-vax. He’s way more pro-vax than “taxes bad”. I think he voted Biden in 2020.-

      • jeffw@lemmy.worldOP
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        6 months ago

        Hey, I’m not defending right wing idiot libertarians, but at least there was an ideological consistency. Now they call themselves libertarians and they preach authoritarian ideas.

        • xmunk
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          6 months ago

          Oh, I didn’t mean to come off accusatory - I think the moment I was absolutely sure they were full of shit was when pro-life became a generally endorsed talking point.

          • jeffw@lemmy.worldOP
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            6 months ago

            No worries, I didn’t take it as an accusation. But yes! That became a huge issue all of a sudden for “libertarians” over the past few years. “Defending the fetus’ liberties”??? Or some shit like that?

    • Eldritch@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      Probably not many of us were alive and politically minded in the early 20th century. Pre 1950.

      • the_crotch
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        6 months ago

        The national libertarian party enshrined gay rights in their founding charter in 1974 when the Dems and repubs were still holding hands and singing “god hates fags” together in unison

        • Eldritch@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          That doesn’t mean that they hadn’t been infiltrated by a right-wing group with equally regressive ideals. What good is having rights if you can’t access them? I’ll give him credit when they were four gay marriage and decriminalizing marijuana before many major politicians were. That doesn’t make up for all their deficiencies. Or the fact that they’re not actually Libertarians who believe in public ownership of Natural Resources Etc.

          Quick edit. Also I never defended Republicans Or democrats yeah they’re plenty of s***. But modern larpitarians are Justice full of s***.

          • the_crotch
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            6 months ago

            I didn’t accuse you of saying any of that. What you did say was that they lost their way prior to the 1950s, which would be a neat trick for an entity that didn’t exist until 1974.

            • Eldritch@lemmy.world
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              6 months ago

              Libertarianism goes back to the 19th century. Not the 1970s. The ideology etc lost it’s way post red scare. When actual libertarian groups and all leftist in general largely laid low. Groups effectively hollowed out, their corpse was reanimated with fash friendly right wing ideologues and ignorant young men. The party at large has ALWAYS been net negative.

              The best way to find out if someone is a serious libertarian, is to find out if they’re a member of the libertarian party. If they are you should always doubt their claims. Another tell of false libertarians is that they constantly publicly identity as such.